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Linda & Vanessa Kaye

Our Inner Life Cycles

By Linda Kaye

Sometime ago, I received a small booklet entitled, "Happy Birthday Therapy." The friend who sent it thought it might cheer me up "in my old age", as he laughingly put it. It's a cute book, designed to help the reader understand about age, growing older, and how to deal with that.

One of the pages reads: "How old do you feel on the inside? Reflect on what your answer reveals about you. Celebrate the child within you - your enthusiasm, passion, hope. Celebrate the adult within you-your maturity, compassion, wisdom."

Rather profound words, I thought, as I read them. And in reading them again recently, I wanted to reflect on where I am in my life cycle, and how these life cycles can affect us as women.

We have only one alternative to aging, and that is death. Obviously, life therefore is very important to us. The quality of our life is dependent solely on ourselves - we have total responsibility for what we do, how we do it and what we feel. I'm not saying that there are not outside influences to our feelings; rather, that we are responsible for how we react to those influences.

There are times in our lives when, despite our chronicle age, we feel very, very old. Our minds, our hearts are old, rather than the body. We lose sight of the youth that lives within us, we forget that the child we once were is still in there. Everything we experience, everything we feel, everything we do remains within the cycle of our life. We cannot go back and change it. Once a moment is lived, it is forever imprinted in our life cycle. We might wish it to be different, it might torment us, but it will never, ever be changed.

I recently reread a favorite book of mine, "A Falling Star," which was written by a woman living in Africa, and, who, in mid-age, met a younger man who changed her life. The book talks about their life together, the love they shared, the enchantment of day-to-day togetherness. Circumstances allowed them to live differently than you or I, in that they lived in Africa, and had opportunities and monies you and I don't have. But the fundamental point of the book is that their love and life together was one that comes along very rarely. They loved each other totally, completely, without reservation, accepting each other exactly as they were. Their life of enchantment continued for nearly two decades.

Not only does the book put into perspective how outside influences can so profoundly affect us, it allows us to see that there can be a love that comes along in life, that so completely fills you that the two lives are fused together, and there is oneness. These two people rediscovered the child in each other. They allowed passion and enthusiasm to encompass their lives, yet allowed maturity, natural compassion for others and each other, and wisdom, to become the bonds for that relationship. When the magic ended with the death of the husband, there was left indomitable love, compassion, dedication to the other. Somehow, this made the pain of letting go bearable. The memories of what had been nurtured the healing. I'll be honest in saying that the story of this couple profoundly altered my life, in that after reading the book, I chose to seek a relationship and subsequent marriage, with Vanessa.

So many times, as we age, mentally and emotionally, as well as physically, we lose sight of this. Society puts us into compact "times of your life," telling you that simply because you are 45, or 50 or 60, that you can't do certain things, because it is inappropriate for someone "your age." Baloney. Age has nothing to do with what you make of your life. Age should have nothing to do with decisions. What your heart tells you is right is what should guide you.

There are so many parts to each of us. To hide those parts, squirrel them away simply because chronological age dictates you are to do so is to lose the essence of your personhood. As women, we need to appreciate each facet of our womanhood, from birth to death. So much happens in between. To put it away, to not experience every moment is a dreadful loss. Life is not an enchanted and magical dimension. Rather, it is a myriad of magic and reality, and to avoid it simply because it hurts or is unpleasant or because someone else tells you it should be avoided, is to deny everything you were created to be.

Our lives are filled with dreams - and to stop dreaming is to allow outside influences to overcome your personhood. "If your life dream has been fulfilled, you may feel that something is still missing. Recast your dream so that it fits who you are now. Embrace your transformed dream." (Happy Birthday Therapy) Dreams are simply hopes, emotions you want to share, possibilities. To stop dreaming gives you nothing to look forward to, and far too much opportunity to dwell on old dreams that never came true. Far better to understand that some things are impossible, but others aren't. Far better to try to make your dreams come true, even if they aren't in the original context. It is okay to transform them, change them, modify them, improve them. And it is a joyful moment when one comes true. If it doesn't, then it was good to dream it. However, life goes on, and there can be more dreams. To go backward is to deny yourself - to allow yourself to die emotionally, to age inside yourself.

All of this is not a question of yourself involved in a gender relationship. Rather, it is a question of whether or not you are willing to allow yourself, as a person and as a woman, to be. It is a question of whether or not you are willing to go past existence, to purposely seek your own happiness, to accept and put away your past defeats or lost dreams. It is a question of whether or not you will be "old" inside, no matter what the outside may seem. There is no reason that you cannot be as youthful in your mind and heart at your point of death as you were at your point of birth. You alone are responsible for what happens in between - no one else - just you.


Linda and Vanessa Kaye both write for Transgender Forum on a regular basis. They also run the Couples Network , a safe place for couples to connect and learn more about living in a relationship with a transgender person. They have their own web site you may enjoy.

Linda and Vanessa have also written a book together: "Life With Vanessa" Straight talk about integrating transgenderism into a loving, caring and positive relationship.

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